1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle air conditioner which can independently control temperature of air blown toward a front seat side and temperature of air blown toward a rear seat side in a passenger compartment.
2. Description of Related Art
In a vehicle air conditioner described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,247,530, a single heating heat exchanger disposed in an air conditioning case is used in common for heating a front seat side and a rear seat side of a passenger compartment. Further, a front air mixing door and a rear air mixing door are independently disposed so that temperature of air blown toward the front seat side and temperature of air blown toward the rear seat side are independently controlled. In the vehicle air conditioner, a switching door is disposed at an air outlet side of the heating heat exchanger, for partitioning an air passage of the heating heat exchanger into a front air passage and a rear air passage at a partition position. Generally, the switching door is positioned at the partition position. When heating capacity of the front seat side is need to be increased, the switching door is operated at a rear shutting position where all warm air passage of the heating heat exchanger communicates only the front air passage. However, in the vehicle air conditioner, the switching door is connected to an actuator mechanism for switching a front air outlet mode through a link mechanism, or a special actuator mechanism having a special motor is provided for operating the switching door.
When the switching door is connected to the actuator mechanism for switching the front air outlet mode, a long link mechanism is necessary for operatively linking the switching door and the actuator mechanism of the front air outlet mode. Therefore, the structure of the link mechanism becomes complex and the size of the link mechanism becomes larger. On the other hand, when the switching door is operated by the special actuator mechanism having the special motor, the production cost is increased, and it is difficult to arrange the special actuator mechanism in a small mounting space.